glow
by visceraEffect
Summary: I've promised you nothing, absolutely nothing and yet you still hold me so tenderly in your arms of love that I don't deserve. Your smile melts my heart and I incessantly beat my hands against your strong chest, to go away and to leave me alone and that I wished I never met you. You kiss me and I taste the bitter taste of my own cigarettes. 5980. [happy valentine's day!]


A/N: Haha, I have a lot more to write for Valentine's Day. I don't own any of these characters! Enjoy~

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From the very start, I didn't know what I was putting forth in this relationship.

It sprung from a drunken night and a mafia party that I swore was supposed to be for mourning Juudaime. And yet, I woke up in a bed, naked and spent, with you beside me and the happiest smile on your sleeping face. It was more addicting than the nicotine in my cigarettes. I stayed to see that smile and I stayed for my own selfish reasons.

Your hands had clutched me so desperately, I thought my skin would break underneath your blunt fingernails. Your face begged me _to stay, don't leave me here alone_. I shook my head that time and exited through the balcony, coolly and calmly, promising to see you back at the Japanese Base. I left Italy because I was scared of what my heart was telling me. I blocked it out, drowned it with bottle after bottle, cigarette after cigarette, woman after woman.

The entire time I was thinking of you.

I couldn't bear to see myself tainting you. Simply, you deserved a woman that could give you everything she had. I couldn't. I devoted myself to Juudaime, and not to anyone else. No one could understand my loyalty but you. You loved him too. I did too. I thought you used me to relieve the stress; I thought that I did too.

But he was gone and who did I have to devote myself to?

My breathing was ragged that day, I remember. The rain streaked down my face like the tears, melding together, forming rivers that spoke of the sorrows in my heart. The blood wouldn't stop, and the rain washed the red from my shirt, but it didn't wash the red from Juudaime. I couldn't breathe; my own tears, the rain, and my heart choked me. My suit was wet and my hair stuck to my face. My vision blurred and all I could hear was screaming and more screaming.

The pureness of white couldn't even help him. Turf top's flames couldn't heal it, a Sun-flame resistant bullet. I remember the somber faces of everyone, even Reborn and his cursed body and his cursed eyes looked darker than usual, blacker even the devil's heart.

We all saw that his killer died. We all made sure his blood painted our skin red.

Juudaime was gone and I barricaded myself in my room. Life was terror. Life was pain. Living was hell.

I debated killing myself, until that fateful party. I hadn't seen you in forever, and we both exchanged greetings.

We all looked older. Even Hibari seemed down. His tonfas were missing and even Hibird was silent the entire time.

You still looked splendid. When you weren't looking, I touched your back to see if it felt as muscular as it looked. To this day, I can't tell if you noticed or not. I was never the type to achieve the kind of body you had, despite my work with explosives.

After the speeches, I felt myself mechanically grabbing drink after drink. Even the ugliest woman there had to be the most beautiful; the beer goggles confused me because I thought even you were a woman for a moment. But admittedly, I thought you were the most beautiful woman in the room, so that should've counted for something…

You had dragged me to a side room of the mansion, telling me to slow down with the drinks.

I spit in your face, screaming that you didn't feel the same way I did about Juudaime and that he meant the world to me.

You were silent but your eyes hardened.

I still remember what you said. "Tsuna saved me from death. It counts for everything, if not more than you. You were a silly goof-off that slipped up and almost blew himself up. I was at the bottom of the bottom. I loved him, if not more, than you. I chose to show it in a different way."

It made me regret spitting at you. It made me regret pulling away from the world like a selfish shit. It made me regret not looking at the agonized faces that I blindly ignored every day.

It made me cry into your suit, rough, keening wails that I hear in my nightmares as the background to every bloodstain. I remember your hands rubbing circles into my back, attempting to soothe my sobbing.

My drunken self looked up and you locked eyes with me. I swear I didn't mean to kiss you, but it's not like I regret it now.

Even in the present, I'm afraid of saying _I love you_. What truly is love? My sister feels love for Reborn, and yet she pines alone in her room, surrounded by darkness and cold. Juudaime had felt love for Kyoko, but in the end, their love fell apart as the strings were cut. Is love destined to be miserable? If it were so, I would gladly give up my heart so as to not hurt anymore.

But that would mean _not loving you._

You who sewed up the fragments of my heart with your tender, calloused fingers. You whose smell is of rain and dewy mornings. You who showed up on my doorstep once with a bright smile and a box of chocolates.

I had forgotten it was February 14. Who needed a day for love when every day seemed like love would never come? I had planned to drink myself into a coma to avoid seeing people and kissing couples, because I couldn't face you.

And yet, I still opened that door, physically and emotionally, to you.

Today, I promise I won't forget February 14. I promise I won't forget to look at your face and understand your pain and your happiness. I promise I'll quit smoking to prolong the time I have with you, whether happy or sad. I promise that I'll try to never hurt you, because your tears hurt me more than you. And so...

To my beloved Yamamoto Takeshi, Happy Valentine's Day.

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Reviews appreciated! :)


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